The System Shock 2 Community Patch (SCP) Beta 2 is now out. In the words of its authors:

"SCP is intended to serve as an unofficial patch for System Shock 2 that delivers an authentic but also highly polished gameplay experience, hopefully approximating the form SS2 would have taken if Irrational had had a few more months to work on it before release. It is not a total conversion, a source port, a reimagining, or a remake. It is not SS2 for experts, nor is it SS2 for newbies. Its just SS2, but better."

So head on to systemshock.org, where you can find more details about this patch, download, and discuss it.

Yes, the game that started it all in 1994, System Shock, is now available on Steam and GOG.

It's an Enhanced Edition (which also includes the classic version of the game), containing several of the community's mods and improvements on the original game and much more, such as mouselook support, remappable keys, or enhanced resolution.

So go ahead, Employee 2-4601, grab a copy and jump back into Citadel Station!

Given the sheer amount of mods and enhancements that the community has made for System Shock 2 over the years, it's pretty easy to get confused or lost deciding which ones we might wish to install. Well, thanks to Chris' work, that problem may very well be a thing of the past.

You can check out the excellent and thorough Ultimate Guide to SS2 Mods that he has compiled for us, where every available mod is described in detail, helping you decide what best suits your needs.

xdiesp has just announced over at our forums that a new fan mission for System Shock 2, 'System Shock Infinite', is now available for download. This minimod is a collaboration between him, Phantasmagore, ShephardReborn, and CaptainLKL.

For more details, install instructions and discussions about this FM, you can check the relevant thread.

And the goodies just keep on coming. We have just received word from Josh 'Robotkid' Randall, concerning the System Shock 2 soundtrack:

"Josh Randall here. I was the producer for Thief and System Shock 2 back in the day. I was also the guy who did the electro bits of the System Shock 2 soundtrack.[...] I decided to post the original multi-track recordings that made up some of the songs from the SS2 soundtrack. I also posted some thoughts about each track, and the gear I used. I hope you and your readers enjoy!"

We just got some delightful news: a new unofficial patch for System Shock 2 has surfaced! This is huge! The patch (along with a similar patch for Thief II) was announced by a mysterious user named 'Le Corbeau' on the French forum Ariane4ever. The list of changes introduced by this patch is simply amazing, making both games fully compatible with modern hardware and Windows releases, and opening new horizons for the modding community.

A small sample of changes and fixes (from the release notes):

Renderer:

Added windowed mode

Added single display mode option - no resolution change between menus and game

Added ingame support for all common resolutions, including widescreen

Added support for 32-bit color

Textures can now be automatically promoted to 32-bit, improving quality and effectively eliminating the palette limit

Added UI framerate cap option to avoid GPU fan spinning up in UI

Added DDS/PNG image support

Added full 24/32-bit TGA/BMP image support

Increased the maximum number of frames allowed in animated textures from 20 to 99, and increased the allowable filename length for animated textures (before the underscore) to support more than 7

Animated texture rate can now be specified via a material file for that texture

Back at our forums, Devin has announced his excellent effort in compiling a list of all the stuff that has been left out of the final release of good old System Shock (yes, it could have had even MORE goodies). Even though seventeen years have passed since its release, we can still find out new stuff about it.

So if you're curious to find out a bit more about the unused content that Devin has been digging out of the game's resource files, you can just head over here.

This site was designed and constructed by the same hack-crazy Taffer who built and
runs TTLG, Thief-thecircle.com, and the Irrational Games website. It was coded 100%
in a text editor, and the images were created using Paint Shop Pro 5. For best viewing
results, you should be using IE 4.x or greater, no less then 800x600 resolution, and
hopefully something greater then 256 colors. The author of this site would like to thank
Al for the good design advice, Saam for getting him in the biz in the first place, and
Lu for having such a sinister face! All System Shock related stuff is copyright Looking
Glass Studios, Irrational Games, and Electronic arts.